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The red sun sets as searchers and divers look for bodies of passengers believed to have been trapped in the sunken ferry Sewol near buoys that mark the vessel in the water off the southern coast near Jindo, south of Seoul, South Korea, April 22, 2014. One by one, coast guard officers carried the newly arrived bodies covered in white sheets from a boat to a tent on the dock of this island, the first step in identifying a sharply rising number of corpses from the South Korean ferry that sank nearly a week ago.
((Associated Press photo/Ahn Yung-joon))

From daily commuters to tourists, Staten Island Ferry passengers feel in safe hands while traveling across the harbor on the fleet of vessels that the city Department of Transportation calls "the safest it can be."

A daily
ferry commuter for 21 years, West Brighton resident Joseph Sciddurlo told the Advance that
he feels safe on the vessels. "I'm assuming there will be no emergency," he
remarked, when asked if he was aware of safety protocols in the event of an incident requiring evacuation on water.

"I get on,
sit down, and don't think about it," said Ryan Peskofski, 26, of Great Kills,
who has been riding the ferry since he was five years old. "I know where the
life jackets are."

"I don't
think about it either - it gets me to work every day," added his friend,
Michael Krebs, 26, also of Great Kills.

"I feel very
safe, but I notice the signs about where the life preservers are," said Naim
Saidi of St. George, who has used the ferry for almost 30 years to commute to
work in Manhattan. His only complaint? "The hard bumps sometimes, that make you lose your balance."

"I try not
to think about it," said Mary Ellen Thomas of Concord, when asked if she would
know what to do in the event of an emergency on the ferry. "I think the
life jackets on some boats are under the seats, right?" She admitted she's not a
fan of traveling on water, and doesn't use the ferry frequently. "I'd never go
on a cruise ship, and I don't really like riding the ferry, but how else are
you going to get across?"

"I feel safe (on the ferry), but the first thing
I always notice is where the life jackets are," said Jonathan Landry of
Montreal, on his fourth visit to New York City with his girlfriend, Alexandra
Lamontagne. The couple stayed at the Holiday
Inn on Staten Island for this four-day visit, driving their car to the ferry (for a $7
parking fee, compared $10 for roundtrip bus fare from Travis to St. George for both of them) and then onward to Manhattan.

DOT: 'SAFETY OVER SCHEDULE' APPROACH

The Department of Transportation emphasizes the preparedness of ferry crews and other first responders for emergencies of all kinds, including a worse-case-scenario mass rescue.

"The recent tragedy in
waters nearly 7,000 miles across the globe is a stark reminder that passenger
safety trumps all else," DOT wrote in a statement to the Advance. "We take a 'safety-over-schedule' approach to
operating these vessels on a 24-7 basis, transporting over 65,000 daily
passengers using our world-class fleet.

"As ferry safety is discussed worldwide, we continue to
focus on our ongoing commitment to making the Staten Island Ferry the safest it
can be," the statement continued.

"Staten Island Ferry personnel constantly drill throughout the
year for potential situations -- ranging from single passengers going overboard
to significantly larger scale rescues -- oftentimes observed by and/or joined by
US Coast Guard, FDNY and NYPD teams."